SIR,-1 was not surprised to read the replies of Messrs
McKillop and Heckstall-Smith to my letter printed in your issue of September 30.
Both these letters revealed the outdated, unpro- fessional ideas which lie behind them. Mr McKillop, for instance, refers to 'one of my so-called gangs of "above average intelligence".' He does not appear to rate their intelligence very high, and it is quite pos- sible he has never found out their IQs. But I can assure him that if his pupils have absorbed Latin and French grammar at the age of nine, as most prep schools expect them to, they are well above average.
I deeply sympathised with the angry governor men- tioned by Mr Heckstall-Smith. The poor man was just trying to ensure the p'arents got value for money but he met a wall of complacency. The English view that any old amateur is better than a professional dies hard. I have had experience of a private board- ing school in which five of the masters had neither,. a certificate nor a degree, yet the parents paid high
fees for services bought at a cheap rate. Mr Heck- stall-Smith, who believes that untrained teachers are better, would probably hesitate to take sick children to a faith healer and, like the majority of us, prefer a trained graduate. Why not apply this to education?
I would, as a trained graduate teacher, earnestly urge parents to examine and analyse their reasons for sending their children to expensive boarding schools and ask themselves whether it is worth it. I recommend that they read a Pelican book by John Bowlby entitled Child Care and the Growth of Love, and consider then whether a good home is not in- finitely superior to any boarding school.
14 Eden Place, Carlisle
PETER MIDDLETON